


A New Look

by Parasitikos



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Choking, M/M, Trauma, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-03
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:47:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21655495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Parasitikos/pseuds/Parasitikos
Summary: The Speaker is so surprised by Reliquary that he kisses him. Reliquary can't wrap his head around the idea of someone doing that without wanting something from him and reacts very poorly to the situation
Relationships: Male Guardian/Speaker (Destiny)
Kudos: 13





	A New Look

**Author's Note:**

> Day one of destember but i didn't wanna do Reliquary in new clothes so instead his "new look" is smiling for the first time since his ghost rezzed him. I did NOT proofread this is any way whatsoever

The Speaker had known Reliquary-23 personally for two years now. He had watched him on his way to still the wretched heart that beat in the Garden, how he put an end to the threat of the House of Wolves. How he went alone onto the Dreadnaught and returned after two months of silence only to return again to put a permanent end to the threat its king posed. Reliquary had been thrust into a position in which all of the City rested on his shoulders, but not once did he shrug. Without even a complaint, he stood up straight with the weight and put an end to one extinction level threat after another and never took a break between. But in all the time he had known him, in all the time anyone had known him, he had never seen him smile. Cold and calculating were his orange eyes and if The Speaker didn't know better he might've been concerned about his viability as a Guardian and worried about a propensity for betrayal and defection to the dark. He was not sure what hid beneath his harsh gaze, but he knew he had a strong sense of duty and that was enough.

The Speaker couldn't even remember what he said. What either of them had said. Their conversation had evaporated from his head in an instant, sublimated to vapor, dissipated in an instant. For the first time, The Speaker saw Reliquary-23 smile. The world around him slammed to a halt and then all of creation changed their orbital trajectories to revolve around Reliquary, a being of surely infinitely greater gravity than anything else in the universe. He himself was gripped by his event horizon and he was forced closer, closer, but proximity wasn't enough. Reliquary's gravity threatened to pull his heart right out of his chest like it'd already pulled all of his thoughts from his head. With only the image of his smile in his head, he grabbed his face, tilted his chin up, and kissed him. And then his smiled dropped, killed by surprise, and all of reality violently returned to its original path and The Speaker was left alone with his uncharacteristically impulsive actions. "I'm sorry," He stammered as he let go and took a step back, "I don't know what came over me." He watched as Reliquary stared at him, them touched his mouth, as if the answers to whatever question was in his head lied there.

"You kissed me." Flat. No. Confused? 

"It was incredibly inappropriate of me. I'm sorry." The Speaker lowered his head to emphasize his regret, but pride kept him from articulating the depth to which the regret ran. 

"Why?" Reliquary's question came cold and harsh, a demand against which he would not defend himself.

"Because it was wrong. We barely know each other—"

"No, no, why did you kiss me?" He asked, insistent, questioning like this was an interrogation. Accusatory. For all his barely contained anger, all The Speaker could think of then was his smile. 

"Because when you smiled I thought you were the most beautiful thing in the world." The words fell from his lips without restraint, like water down a river, and he flinched at how unexpectedly honest he was. This man was dangerous, not because of the gun at his hip or the light at his fingertips, but because without even knowing it he could reach right into The Speaker and pull out whatever his heart said before his brain could even begin to interfere.

But Reliquary was unsatisfied with this answer, clearly, because first his face showed he was surprised, then he was disgusted. His eyes bore deep into him and searched his insides for answers to a question The Speaker didn't know. "What are you looking for?" He stood his ground against the weight of a threat that Reliquary did not speak, but showed him in the tension of his body. The way he realigned his body, changed his center of gravity. To run or to fight, he couldn't tell. Reliquary's fingers curled ever so slightly around the imaginary shape of a gun. The kiss was unprompted, it was unprofessional, it was selfish. But why did it illicit such a response from him? He couldn't help it, this man took away all his rationality: "Why do you look like a cornered animal?" And then Reliquary recoiled back in surprise, then surged forward in anger. 

"You want something from me. That's the only reason you would've done that." He snapped, one step after another towards The Speaker "Tell me straight: What is it you want from me? I'm not your plaything. I won't be used so easily—" The Speaker stared at him. Reliquary was still talking, but he couldn't hear him, even as he shoved his face in his and forced him farther and farther back until he bumped into the wall. He couldn't look away. Had he heard right? Did he think he was doing this for something more ulterior than affection or lust? Something more than the impulse of an old man's lonely heart? He knew Reliquary had lived a long and surely tumultuous life in the dark ages, but oh! How sad! To receive a kiss and react like this! He reached up to touch his face, but Reliquary grabbed him by the wrist and pinned it to the wall.

"What's your aim?!" He roared. Raw light roiled underneath his metal body, void light flicking out between the pieces of him like a flame kept barely one step from a raging, all consuming blaze. The Speaker stared defiantly back at Reliquary, but when he did not answer, Reliquary grabbed his chin and squeezed, threatening to break his jaw entirely. The pain jolted straight into The Speaker's skull and it brought him back to the reality of the situation. 

"I don't have one!" He shouted back. Reliquary did not flinch and The Speaker shivered under the iron weight of his unwavering gaze. Reliquary was only an inch or so taller than him, but at this moment he towered over him like an inevitability. He choked out every other inch of space until all that remained was Him. The Speaker shivered and he had to swallow hard, throat pressing against the back of Reliquary's cold hand, just to find his voice again. "I don't have one." He said again, whispered this time for it was all he could manage. 

Reliquary searched his eyes for any indicated of a lie or a deception. He found none, but could not believe that, so he wrapped his hand around The Speaker's neck. He grabbed the hand around his neck, but he didn't try to pull him away. He didn't so much as writhe as the air was choked from him. And Reliquary could not understand why. Why such dedication to this con? Why leave himself so vulnerable? The Speaker's ghost was screaming in his ear. It would be so easy to just grab it and kill its light, then kill The Speaker. Reliquary could not understand why The Speaker trusted to not do just that and so, worried that this too might be some part of an elaborate plan he didn't yet grasp, he threw The Speaker to the ground to cough and gasp again for air.

"I did it because I wanted to!" The Speaker heaved. His ghost immediately went to his side but he waved away their help. "There was no bigger aim than I simply wanted to! What awful things have been done to you that you can't understand that!" Reliquary didn't say anything, back to his usual silence, "Not once. Not _once_ have I seen you smile before. I don't have the words to how that made feel!" His head spun as he shouted without catching his breath, "It was like the rest of the world didn't exist, there was just _you_! I don't know what else you want me to say! I—" His words caught in his throat as he coughed in a fit, then gasped for the air he'd denied his body.

"Why?" Reliquary asked, crouching down to be at The Speaker's level, "Why did you want to in the first place?"

"Because you were beautiful when you smiled. It was a new look." Then quietly, to himself more than anything, "I would like to see you smile again." 

"That doesn't make any sense." He furrowed his brow and The Speaker laughed once, but immediately choked on it. He chuckled when he regained his breath and defiantly looked back at him.

"You don't have to understand it for it to be true, Reliquary." He said. For a long moment after that they stared each other down and to his great surprise, Reliquary looked away first. Without a word he got up, grabbed his things, and left The Speaker there alone on the floor of his office. The Speaker slowly sat up proper and rubbed his face. He sighed and sincerely hoped, more than anything, that Reliquary would at least consider what he'd said.


End file.
